Robot assembly gets started next month at new base

Their facilities at a high-end intelligent manufacturing base are being inspected by ABB Robotics (Zhuhai) personnel. The Sinomach (Zhuhai) Robotic Engineering Center (REC) is to be the sole headquarters in South China for Asea Brown Boveri (ABB) of Switzerland, a pioneering technology leader in the robot industry.

ABB Robotics (Zhuhai) will begin R&D, assembly, testing, and integration of robots, rather than manufacture, in the park once the facilities are put into use in October, according to Chen Zhiyu, REC assistant president.

The base itself, a 4 billion-yuan ($626 million) partnership project, is located at the Technological Innovation Coast of the National Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone (Tangjiawan). It is invested by China National Machinery Industry Corp (Sinomach) and United Faith Group.

Envisioned is an integrated incubator, accelerator, and public technology mix. The intelligent manufacturing demonstration base receives support from the provincial and municipal governments. 

ABB robot development site [Photo by Cheng Lin / Zhuhai Daily]

In June, the 250 million-yuan ($39 million) Area S1 became the first completed section of the four-part project. It covers 90 mu (14.8 acres) including 1.5 hectares (3.7 acres) of R&D office building and 3 hectares (7.4 acres) spread across two factories.

The S2 land parcel came under construction last December. The investment of 780 million yuan ($122 million) will be spent on the Clover Headquarters Economy R&D office building, R&D factory, and large comprehensive office complex, support office facilities, and underground robotic parking lot. Floor space will total 17.7 hectares (44 acres). It is to open by 2019.

Still on the drawing board are the S3 and S4 parcels with floorage of 20 hectares (49 acres).

The entire project will eventually cover 66.67 hectares (165 acres) with gross floor area of 1.04 sq km (.4 sq miles). Once operational, the total output value is to reach 10 billion yuan ($1.6 billion).

More than 10 enterprises are lined up to locate in the park, including Tomatech (Shenzhen) Automation and Guangzhou Multicam Machinery.